Update: Eskom continues Stage 2 load shedding into Friday 15 March

kendal power station south africa

Update, Friday 15 March, 8am: Just when you thought your weekend will be load shedding-free, Eskom on Friday announced that Stage 2 load shedding will commence from 8am to 11pm.

Update, Thursday 14 March, 1pm: Eskom has announced that it will upgrade today’s load shedding level to Stage 2 from 3pm.

Original article: After a run of a few load shedding free days, Eskom has today announced that Stage 1 load shedding will be implemented on Thursday from 11am to 11pm.

“This is due to plant breakdowns, resulting in an imbalance between supply and demand,” tweeted spokesperson Khulu Phasiwe Thursday morning.

Phasiwe failed to reveal which plants were affected.

Earlier this week, Eskom announced that the risk for load shedding was high, but the utility did not implement the emergency measure.

Today, it seems that it’s required to prevent “total collapse” of South Africa’s electrical grid.

“Stage 1 calls for 1000MW to be rotationally loadshed nationally at a given period,” it wrote in a release on Thursday.

“Load shedding is conducted rotationally as a measure of last resort to protect the power system from a total collapse or blackout.”

For load shedding schedules, we recommend taking a look at our previous coverage of South African-made load shedding alert apps.

Otherwise, have a quick gander at some of South Africa’s largest municipalities, and their schedules below:

This is a developing story…

Feature image: Kendal Power Station in 2008, by Graeme Williams/Media Club via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0, resized)

Andy Walker, former editor
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